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And now... The one, the only... BOFH! Sorry.. its long as hell (42 pages)... More fun to read :D

BASTARD OPERATOR FROM HELL PROLOG #1
I'm really bored. You know how bored you get when work's going on and on and on, and nothing interesting is happening, and you're listening to a radio that picks up ONE station on FM, and it's always the station with the least records in the city, about 5, and one of them is "You're so Vain" which wasn't too bad a song until you hear it about 3 times a day for a year, and EVERY time it plays, the announcer tells you it's about Warren Beatty and who he's currently poking, someone you'll never sniff the toe-jam of, let alone meet, let alone get amorous with. And EVERY time someone mentions Warren Beatty, someone says that he used to go out with Madonna too, and have you seen "In Bed With.." AND THEN, someone ELSE will say "It wasn't really about Warren Beatty, it was James Taylor" and the first person will say "What, `In bed with Madonna'", and they laugh and everyone else laughs, and I pull out the Magnum from under the desk where I keep it in case someone laughs at a joke that's so dry it's got a built in water-fountain, and blow the lot of them away as a community Service. I figure that I'll get time off my sentence if I ever kill someone by accident who's got a life.

So visitors are getting pretty thin at the moment, and the Quick-Lime Pits are filling up rapidly, and all I've got to do is the full backups and maybe I can go home.

So, to relieve the boredom, I get some iron filings and pour them into the back of my Terminal until it fizzes out (Which doesn't take all that long, surprisingly enough), then call our maintenance contractors and log a fault on the device. Sometimes they'll send someone who knows what they're doing, but it's a lot more fun when they don't - which is about 98% of the time.

So they maintenance guy comes in, and I can tell he's NEW because the photo on his ID actually LOOKS like him, not like the head engineer, whose photo is a black and white tin-type (he's that old).

Maintenance Contractors always dress up nice, with a tie and everything because they believe that a customer will trust a nicely dressed guy.

Because he's NEW and ALONE, he's what you call an appeasement engineer, the new guy they send so they respond within the 4 hour guaranteed response period. (Things are getting better and better) Your average appeasement engineer is about as clued-up on computers as the average computer "hacker" is about B.O, and their main job is to make sure the power plug is in and switched on, then call back to the office for "PARTS". The really keen ones will sometimes even take a cover off the equipment and pretend that they see this stuff all the time. I wonder what sort today's is...

"You got a dud terminal?" he asks pleasantly.

I tell him yeah, and bring him into the control room.

"Which one is it?" he asks, confused by the fact that only one of them is smoking.

"It's the Model Three" I say, giving NOTHING away.

"Ah, the old model three!" he says knowingly, without a clue what a model three is, or which one of the three terminals it is, which isn't surprising, as I just made it up.

"We get a lot of model three problems" he says nodding "So what actually happened?"

Sneaky, but not good enough. I'm not going to point it out to him.

"It just went dead" I say, in luser mode.

"I see. Could you just recreate what you were doing so I can check the unit out when it's ready for operation?"

Very Sneaky. I decide to let him off the hook.

"Look, I've got to go to the toilet, there it is over there" I say, pointing at our Waffle-Iron.

"But that's a Wa..." He says, then stops. He's a beginner, and it's just possible that the company has a line of terminals that look like waffle irons. He bites.

"Sorry" he says, smiling again "for a minute there I thought it was a model 2!"

A reasonably good save, but it won't save him.

I leave, which means he's got to take it to bits, otherwise he knows I won't believe he's worked on it. I give him a couple of minutes to get the element exposed then wander back in.

"So how does it look?" I ask, concerned-like.

"Well, I think we could have a processor problem.." he says concentrating on prying the element up.

....concentrating so much that he doesn't notice me plugging the iron in.

"Shouldn't you be wearing an earthing strap?" I ask innocently.

When he thinks I can't see, he creeps his hand over to the wiring frame and says "Well, It's just as easy to hold onto earth like this"

"But what about the risk of a cross-the-body shock with no resistor in series with you?" I ask ever-so-more-innocently.

"Oh, it's OK" he says "the unit's unplug..."

>click< >BZZZZZZZEEERRT!< >clunk!<

I ring the maintenance help-desk again...

It's Rhonda.

"Hey Rhonda!, Ah, I'm going to need another engineer and a new Waffle Iron over here; for some reason your engineer opened up my Waffle Iron without switching it off."

Rhonda knows me. It's the third call and the third appeasement engineer. "You're a real *****" she says, annoyed.

But at least now the radio's off, it was on it's 12 repeat of "Wildfire" THIS WEEK, and it's only Tuesday; **** I hate that.

So anyway, I quicklime the engineer to remove any fingerprints and then FedEx him back to headquarters and set about waiting for the engineer.

Now the second engineer only has to come out after another 4 hours, there's no death of engineer penalty clause, (but I'm thinking about asking for one) so I've got to fill in some time. This guy's going to be a technical engineer, the sort that comes in with a raggedy tie where he got it caught in the drum printer at 3000 rpm a couple of years ago, and he'll have the grazes on the face that indicate that he didn't get the gate open in time... I know these sorts...

So I fill in a couple of hours by killing users off and deleting their files, then waiting for them to call...

"Um, I can't find my files" the whimpering simp on the phone says.

"Files? What files?"

"The files in my account. My thesis, my research - all gone!"

"Gone ay? What's your username?"

"TURGEN."

"TROJAN?! LIKE THE CONDOM?"

"No TURGEN. T-U-R"

"OH Turgen, like TURD, but with a GEN instead of a D... OK letŐs see..."

I make vague clicking noises my dragging the quicklimed man's fingers back and forth across the keypad.

"Well, what are you calling ME for? We don't make the files you know, we just look after them. And chopitty-chop too, your thesis looks like it's due in a couple of days.."

I hang up - he'll call back. Meantime I open up a copy of "VMS BASTARD OPERATORS MANUAL FROM HELL" I'm reading the article I sent in about getting rid of those trouble users...

"... Modify the user's password minimum from 6 to 32 letters, give
the password a 1 day lifetime, set it so that they HAVE to
use the password generate utility when they change their
password (so their password will always be something that
looks like vaguely pronounceable line-noise), add a secondary
password with the same as the above, then redefine their CLI
tables so that the only command that works is DELETE, and all
other commands point to it."

Beautiful. **** I'm good!

He calls back.

"MY FILES ARE GONE!" he screams, panicking.

"Did you have a backup?" I ask, as sweet as pie.

"But that's what you people are supposed to do!" he sobs.

"Yeah, well we did - but then we switched to those 8 mm tapes, and they're the same size as the ones in my video camera, so I've been using them to tape the neighborŐs sex romps..."

I hear the revolver go off, but what the hell, it's 5pm, and not my problem...

BASTARD OPERATOR FROM HELL PROLOG #3
So the second engineer rolls up, but the FedEx man has been and gone, so he misses out altogether.

This guy's a techno, (you can tell by the tie) but he's smart (no grazes), so I'm going to have to be wary.

"What's the problem?" he asks, in a business-like manner.

"It's the model three" I say (what the hell, it worked before).

"What the ****Ős a model three?" he asks confused.

He could be just testing me, but I decide to come clean. He doesn't notice so I just walk funny for a couple of minutes and then show him the terminal that I'd poured the iron filings into.

So anyway, he gets to work opening the cover and making board replacement noises. I decide to help and point out a fuse that's blown on the power supply board.

"Oh, I haven't got the parts for that - I've only got a replacement board." he says in a confused manner. "Which one was the fuse again?"

I point it out to him.

"Wow! And what does it do again? You know, I've been working at the same place for 6 years, and I've never seen one of those fuse thingys. It's amazing what you learn isn't it!"

"What are you again?" I ask, already suspecting the answer.

"Chief Engineer."

Thought so.

"Say, do you know anything about waffle irons?"

"A little..."

>Click!< >Fzzzzzzeeet!< >Clunk<

THE BASTARD OPERATOR FROM HELL #1
It's backup day today so I'm pissed off. Being the BOFH, however, does have it's advantages. I assign the tape device to null - it's so much more economical on my time as I don't have to keep getting up to change tapes every 5 minutes. And it speeds up backups too, so it can't be all bad.

"Oh" (Not knowing what I'm talking about, they're satisfied) "Do you know when it will be fixed?"

"Fixed? There's 275 users on your machine, and one of them is you. Don't be so selfish - logout now and give someone else a chance!"

"But my research results are due in tomorrow and all I need is one page of Laser Print.."

"SURE YOU DO. Well; You just keep telling yourself that buddy!" I hang up.

Sheesh, you'd really think people would learn not to call!

The phone rings. It'll be him again, I know. That annoys me. I put on a gruff voice.

"HELLO, SALARIES!"

"Oh, I'm sorry, I've got the wrong number"

"YEAH? Well what's your name buddy? Do you know WASTED phone calls cost money? DO YOU? I've got a good mind to subtract your wasted time, my wasted time, and the cost of this call from your weekly wages! IN FACT I WILL! By the time I've finished with you, YOU'LL OWE US money! WHAT'S YOUR NAME - AND DON'T LIE, WE'VE GOT CALLER ID!"

I hear the phone drop and the sound of running feet - he's obviously going to try and get an alibi by being at the Dean's office. I look up his username and find his department. I ring the Dean's secretary.

"Hello?" she answers.

"HI, SIMON, B.O.F.H HERE, LISTEN, WHEN THAT GUY COMES RUNNING INTO YOUR OFFICE IN ABOUT 10 SECONDS, CAN YOU GIVE HIM A MESSAGE?"

"I think so..." she says.

"TELL HIM `HE CAN RUN, BUT HE CAN'T HIDE'."

"Um. OK."

"AND DON'T FORGET NOW, I WOULDN'T WANT TO HAVE TO TELL ANYONE ABOUT THAT FILE IN YOUR ACCOUNT WITH YOUR ANSWERS TO THE PURITY TEST IN IT..."

I hear her scrabbling at the terminal...

"DON'T BOTHER - I HAVE A COPY. BE A GOOD GIRL AND PASS THE MESSAGE ON."

She sobs her assent and I hang up. And the worst thing is, I was just guessing about the purity test thing. I grab a quick copy anyway, it might make for some good late-night reading.

Meantime backups have finished in record time, 2.03 seconds. Modern technology is wonderful, isn't it?

Another user rings.

"I need more space" he says.

"Well, why don't you move to Texas?" I ask.

"No, on my account, stupid."

Stupid?!?.... Uh-Oh...

"I'm terribly sorry" I say, in a polite manner equal to that of Jimmy Stewart in a Family Matinee "I didn't quite catch that. What was it that you said?"

I smell the fear coming down the line at me, but it's too late, he's a goner and he knows it.

"Um, I said what I wanted was more space on my account, please."

"Sure, hang on."

I hear him gasp his relief even though he covered the mouthpiece.

"There, you've got plenty of space now."

"How much have I got."

Now this REALLY PISSES ME OFF! Not only do they want me to give them extra disk, they want to check it, to correct me if I don't give them enough. They should be happy with what I give them and that's it!!!

Back into Jimmy Stewart mode.

"Well, let's see, you have 4 Meg available."

"Wow! Eight Meg in total, thanks!" he says pleased with his bargaining power.

"No" I interrupt, savoring this like a fine red, at room temperature "4 Meg in total..."

"Huh?... I'd used 4 Meg already, How could I have 4 Meg Available?"

I say nothing. It'll come to him.

"aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaagggggghhhhhH!"

I kill me; I really do!

BASTARD OPERATOR FROM HELL #2
I'm sitting at the desk, playing x-tank, when some thoughtless bastard rings me on the phone. I pick it up.

"Hello?" I say.

"Who is this?" they say.

"It's me I think" I say, having been through a telephone skills course.

"Me Who?"

"Is this like a knock knock joke?" I say, trying anything to save myself having to end this game.

Too LATE! I get killed.

Now I'm pissed!

"What can I do for you?" I ask pleasantly - (one of the key warning signs).

"Um, I want to know if we have a particular software package.."

"Which package is that?"

"Uh, B-A-S-I-C it's called."

>clickety clickety d-e-l b-a-s-i-c.e-x-e<

"Um no, we don't have that. We used to though.."

"Oh. Oh well, the other thing I wanted to know was, could the contents of my account be copied to tape to I have a permanent copy of them to save at home in case the worst happens.."

"The worst?"

"Well, like they get deleted or something..."

"DELETED! Oh, don't worry about that, we have backups" (I'm such a ****) "What was your username?"

"Ah well, that'll be the problem, there was a virus in our system this morning, the... uh... De Vinci Virus, wipes out users who are logged in when it goes off."

"That can't be right, my girlfriend was logged in, and I'm in her account now!"

"Which one was that?"

He tells me the username. Some people NEVER learn...

"Oh, yeah, her account was just after we discovered the virus." >clickety click< "..she only lost all her files."

"But..."

"But don't worry, we've got them all on tape."

"Oh, thank goodness!!!"

"Paper tape. Have you got a magnifying glass and a pencil. SEE YOU IN THE MACHINE ROOM!!!! NYAHAHAHAHAHA!"

I'm such a *****!

BASTARD OPERATOR FROM HELL #3
So I'm working so hard I barely have time to drive into town and watch a movie before I told people their printing will be ready. The queue's WAAAAY too long to have everything printed (and sorted) by the time I told them, so I kill all the small jobs so there's only 2 left and I can sort them in no time.

Then, after the movie, (which was one of those slack Bertolucci ones that takes about 3 hours till the main character is killed off in a visionary experience) I get back and clear the printouts.

There's about 50 people waiting outside and I've got two printouts. That's about average for me. I thought I'd killed more though. Anyway, I put out the printouts and walk slooowly inside, fingering the clipboard with "ACCOUNTS TO REMOVE" in big letters on the back. No-one says anything. As usual.

I'm sitting back in the Operations Armchair, watching the computer room closed circuit TV, which just happens to be connected to the frame-grabber's Video player (sent off for repair, due back sometime in '94) when the phone rings. That must be the 2nd time today, and it's really starting to get to me!

"Yes?" I say, pausing the picture.

"I've accidentally deleted my C.V.!" the voice at the other end of the line says.

"You have? What was your username?"

He tells me. What the hell, I AM bored.

"Ah no, you didn't delete it - I did."

"What?"

"I deleted it. It was full of ****! You didn't ever get more than a B- in any of your subjects!"

"Huh?"

"And that crap about being a foreign exchange student, that was your girlfriend and we both know it."

"Huh?!!"

"Your academic records. I checked them, you were lying..."

"How did y.." He clicks. "It's you isn't it? THE BASTARD OPERATOR FROM HELL!"

"In the flesh, on the phone and in your account.... You shouldn't have called you know. You especially shouldn't have given me your username.." >clickety< >click< "Neither should you have sent that mail to the System Manager telling him what you think of him in graphic terms..."

"I didn't send any.."

>clickety< >click<......

"No, you didn't did you? But who can tell these days. Not to worry though, It'll all be over VERY soon.." >clickety click< "..change my username back, and..."

"B-b-b.." he blubs, like a stood-up date

"Good-bye now" I say pleasantly, "you've got bags to pack and a life to start over..."

I hang up.

Two seconds later the red phone goes. I pick it up, it's the boss.

He mumbles the username of the person I was just talking to, mentions something about a nasty mail message, and utters the words "You know what to do...", with the dots and everything.

Later, inside the Municipal Energy Authority Computer, as I'm modifying the poor plebeŐs Energy Bill by several zeros, I can't help but think about what lapse of judgment - what act of heinous stupidity causes them to call. Then, even later, when I'm adding the poor plebeŐs photo image over the top of the FBI's online "MOST Wanted Armed and Dangerous, SHOOT ON SIGHT" offenders list, I realize, I'll probably never know; but life goes on.

A couple of hours later, as I see the SWAT vehicle roll up outside the poor plebeŐs apartment I realize that for some, it just doesn't.

But tomorrow is another day.

BASTARD OPERATOR FROM HELL #4
It's a Thursday, and I'm in a good mood. It's payday. I think I'll take some calls. I put the phone back on the hook. It rings.

"I've been trying to get you for hours!" the voice at the other end screams.

"Not, it can't be hours" I say, putting Blade Runner back into it's cover and looking at the back, "it was more like 114 minutes. I was on a long phone call with the big boss, trying to get you users some better facilities."

Hook; Line; and Sinker...
"Oh. I'm sorry."

"That's OK, I'm a tolerant person" I make a mental note to change his password to something nasty in the next couple of days.

"Um, I need to know how to rename a file" he says.

Oh dear... Hang on, it's payday isn't it?! I'm in a good mood.

"Sure. You just go 'rm' and the filename."

"Thanks."

"No worries" (Now I'm in a REALLY good mood. I think I just might write that script to make saving impossible on rogue at random times like I've been think- ing about).

The phone rings again.

"Hello?"

"Hi there" I say.

"Is this the Operators?"

"Yes it is" I say, nice as pie.

"Could you get my printouts out please. I need them urgently, and I printed them over 5 minutes ago."

"Your username?" I ask.

He gives it to me, and I write it down for later. "No worries at all!" I say, and head to the printers.

There's a HUUUUUUUGE pile of printouts there, and sure enough, his is at the top of the pile. I pick it up, split it out of the rest and pour our ink- stained cleaning alcohol all over it, run it over a couple of times with the loaded tape trolley then slam it in the tape safe door some times as well.

Beautiful.

"Here's your printout" I say "Sorry about the delay, we've got a few printer problems."

He takes a look and shits himself.

"Well, can I print it again?" he asks, worried.

"Sure you can" I say "But no promises, the printer's a bit stuffed today."

"Well can I print it on laser - is that working?"

"Yeah of course, but that'll cost you" I say, oozing compassion for the geek.

"It doesn't matter about the cost, THIS IS URGENT!"

I slide-on back into the printer room and put in the toner cartridge we save for special occasions - the one that prints thick black lines down the middle of the page and is all faint on one side. It took me quite a while to make it like that too. The printout shoots through and I bring it out immediately - I don't want to miss this!

"W-w-what's happened to my printout?" he geek-squeals at me. Lucky I wrote that username down - I'm really starting to develop a taste for torture.

"Well nothing. I mean sure, it's a little soiled, but that cartridge has already done 47 thousand pages and been refilled 17 times. It's quite good compared to some we get."

Geek pays up and starts blubbing.

"Hey now. There's no reason to cry! Have you got a disk with your work on it?"

He gives me a box of diskettes and I step inside and run them across the bulk eraser. I come back out again.

"Sorry, I just remembered, our machine is on the fritz, you'll have to take these to the other side of campus to the machine there, it'll print them OK, and it had a brand-new toner yesterday."

"GREAT!"

"No worries. Oh, and hold the disks above your head the whole way there, the earth's magnetic field is particularly strong today."

"Huh?"

"No arguments, just do it."

He wanders off, hand held high. **** I hate myself sometimes.

BASTARD OPERATOR FROM HELL #5
I'm bored senseless, so I pass the time by reading users email. I must admit that today's lot is PARTICULARLY boring, not one good message in all of them. I was expecting at LEAST some veiled reference to a grope in a storeroom, but nothing. So I'm bored senseless by the usual drivel about some relative's surgery and how the weather is over the other side of the world - that sort of crap.

To relieve the boredom, I remove a e-mail party invite from a user's mail and post it under the senders username to alt.singles.with.severe.social. dysfunctions on news, and make a note in my diary to be there with my camcorder. Should be a blast!

Next in line is the online medical records database, in which the company doctors store the current medical histories of the staff. I grep it quickly for "herpes" and "syphilis" and sell the results to the local scum newspaper. I cover my tracks by adding an entry to one of the doctor's online electronic diaries for yesterday saying "$500, Med Recs To Paper" I think that's all it should take...

I move some tapes from the racks to the trolley to make it look like we really use them, then start looking through archie listings for a hidden x-gif site. I find one then start a batch job running under some user's account to get them all back, charged to him. I make sure he's got enough disk for the job by removing any files not related to the task at hand. Like all those "Doctorate Final Report" papers that have got quite large in the last couple of weeks.

I go back to the mail now, as something's bound to have happened. I do a grep on all mail files for the words "pregnant" and "family way", and post them anonymously to the local general interest newsgroup.

Then, before anything can happen, the power goes out! The next second, the phone rings.

"Hello?" I say, annoyed - the coyote was just about to kill roadrunner again!

"Has the comput.."

I hang up. This is a matter of life or death. Quick as I can I rip the computer power cable out of the UPS and plug the TV in. Damn! Wile E. missed again!

Meantime, all the alarms are going off like crazy as the disks spin down, but that's OK, because my Mac and Terminal are hardwired to the UPS in any case; and I'm at the Beer Factory level in Dark Castle too.

The phone rings, so I pull the PABX breaker on the UPS switchboard and it stops. Now to look like I'm working. I break out the puck and the hockey stick and play a little one-on-wall. From the observation window it'll look like I'm being blindingly efficient, as per usual.

10 Minutes later, the power is back and we're two HDA's down, but what the hell, I haven't lost a man, I'm onto the final screen, and there's more cartoons!

The phone rings, it's a luser. (What a surprise)

"Computer Room" I say, being efficient.

"Hello, when will the compu..."

I hang up.

I'm doing well in the screen, all I need do is get past the wizard who throws spells at you and I'm in!

The phone rings again. I put it on hands free.

"Computer Room" I shout, still deep in the game.

"I've lost my files" a user whines over the loudspeaker.

"You bet you have" I say, as my concentration lapses just long enough for me to get zapped by the wizard.

"What was your username?" I say, all sweetness and smiles.

He tells me, I look, and he's right. ****, and I didn't even do it!

Not to be outdone, I change his login directory to the null device, set his path to "." and redefine the command "news" to execute a script in his old login directory to send a nasty message to the equal opportunities officer, then delete itself.

Now that's trying!

BASTARD OPERATOR FROM HELL #6
It's Friday, so I get into work early, before lunch even. The phone rings. ****!

I turn the page on the excuse sheet. "SOLAR FLARES" stares out at me. I'd better read up on that. Two minutes later I'm ready to answer the phone.

"Hello?" I say.

"WHERE HAVE YOU BEEN, I'VE BEEN TRYING TO GET YOU ALL MORNING?!"

I hate it when they shout at me early in the morning. It always puts me in a bad mood. You know what I mean.

"Ah, yes. Well, there's been some solar activity this morning, it always disrupts electronics..." I say, sweet as a sugar pie.

"Huh? But I could get through to my friends?!"

"Yes, that's entirely possible, solar activity is very unpredictable in it's effects. Why last week, we had some files just disappear from a guys account while he was working on it!"

"Really?"

"Straight Up! Hey, do you want me to check your account?"

"Yes please, I've got some important stuff in there!"

"OK, what's your username..."

He tells me. Honestly, it's like shooting a fish in a barrel. Twice. With an Elephant Gun. At point blank range. In the head.

(Do I really need to tell you the clicky clicky bit? I think not)

"How many files are in your account?" I ask.

"Um, well there should be about 20 in my thesis write-up, 10 or so with the data for it, and another 20 or so in a book that I'm writing."

"Hmmm. Well, I think we caught it just in time. You've still got 2 files left... .cshrc and .login."

"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAaaaaaaaaggggggggghhhh!"

He sobs into the receiver a bit - it really turns my stomach.

"What can I do?" he sniffs.

"OK, do you have any of your stuff backed up on floppy?"

"Some, but it's weeks old!"

I fire up the bulk eraser.

"OK" I say "How about I come out and load all that data onto your account pronto so you can get some work done?"

"That'd be great, but it's all at home" he whimpers. "I suppose I'll just load it all in myself tonight."

"Sure. But remember what I said, solar flares are bad for disks and machines. Protect your disks from solar activity to prevent them losing their data."

"How do I do that? Wrap them in tin-foil?"

"NO! TIN FOIL'S THE WORST THING! YOU KNOW WHAT TIN FOIL DOES IN A MICROWAVE DON'T YOU?!"

"Yes..."

"Then don't use it. There's only one thing that protects disks from solar activity..."

BASTARD OPERATOR FROM HELL #7
So I manage AT LONG LAST, to get a couple of hours off for lunch, AND, because I can't leave my desk unattended, I get the janitor in and have him sit in my chair. I tell him that all he has to do is make sure the receiver doesn't accidentally get put back on the hook. He agrees and I'm off.

First stop, the bank. I change a $50 note into quarters and then ask to see a balance of my account. Then I yank the power lead out of the teller's VDU. It dies. I say I'm in a hurry and is the manager around?

He rolls over like a man-sized twinkie and asks what the problem is. I say that all I want is a balance of my accounts. I cross my fingers. YES! He finds the VDU lead out, plugs it in, and logs in, TO THE MANAGER'S ACCOUNT. Now's my chance - I slip up against the counter, slopping 200 coins across the counter. The manager ignores it, but all the tellers dive for the money. I watch, unobserved, as the manager types in his password at the breakneck speed of one character a minute. At that rate I should've got $100 worth.... He finishes typing. "MONEY". What a toughie! Well, that's my mortgage taken care of tonight...

A user that I recognize from "D(eletion) day '89" approaches. I think he's going to talk to me. Even the bank manager is shaking his head furiously. But it's too late, he stops.

"Um, excuse me, Could you tell me what is the best computer to buy to do my thesis on?"

Right.

"You've heard of Commodore 64's?" I ask.

"Yes?..."

"Avoid them like the plague! Not many people know this, but computers aren't made to handle that much memory - it's over 64,000 things, more in some cases. It's a recipe for disaster!"

"Oh!"

"Try something safe and proven. A ZX81 with dual cassette drive if you can get it. The 1K ram model. Write that down. Don't buy a disk drive - You know how they're always failing, but music cassettes last forever!"

"Hey thanks!"

"No worries. What was your username again?"

He tells me. Just in time for D-Day 92. You'd think they'd learn.

I get back to work and the janitor's asleep at the terminal. I ask him if he wants to work here too, but he likes the ability to bust in on people when they're in the toilet...

I put the phone back on the hook, and straight away it rings. I hate it when it does that, it takes me AGES to get my Walkman phones in. It's the hottest hosemonster I've ever met, and she's got a computer problem! I love it when that happens!

"What's your username?" I ask.

She tells me (as if I didn't know).

Quick as I can I read all her e-mail (mostly boring stuff), then grep everyone else's mail files for her username. Nothing. Excellent!

"What's the problem?" I ask, all smiles and charm.

"I can't save my documents, it says something about space."

"Not a problem for long" I say, and delete everyone else on the same disk as her. "You should be fine now..."

"Thank you so much" she gushes.

I make a mental note to do something to her account again tomorrow.

"No worries."

The phone rings almost before I've got it on the hook.

"My files are all gone!" a voice whines out at me.

"When did this happen?" I ask.

"Just now..." he says, through the tears.

"I see. Well, I wouldn't worry, there's three days till the end of the semester, if you work day and night until then, you should get at least a C-."

He sobs a couple more times then hangs up. What a wimp.

THE PHONE RINGS AGAIN!

"The screen on my PC is really dim" The woman at the other end says "Should I wind the brightness knob up?"

"NO!" I scream "Don't touch that knob! Have you any idea of the radiation that comes out of that thing when the knob gets wound up?!!!!"

"Well I..." she says, all uncertain.

"TAKE MY ADVICE!" I say "There's only ONE way to fix a dim display, and that's by power surging the drivers."

The words "power surging" and "drivers" have got her. People hear words like that and go into dummy mode and do ANYTHING you say. I could tell her to run naked across campus with a power cord rammed up her backside and she'd probably do it... Hmmm...

"Have you got a spare power cord?"

"No..."

"Oh well, never mind, we'll have to do the power surge idea... OK, quick as you can, I want you to flick the power switch of your PC on and off 30 times."

Amazing, it probably made it to 27 - the power supply usually shits itself at 15 or so...

"MY COMPUTER BLEW UP!!!" she screams at me down the line.

"Really? Must've been a dodgy power supply! Lucky we found out now! Is your machine still under warranty?"

"NO!"

"Dear oh dear. Well, Best get it repaired then. Did you backup your files?"

"Yes, to the system, Yesterday, but all this morning's work is gone!"

"Oh dear. What was your username, I'll just check that your backups worked OK?"

She tells me....

BASTARD OPERATOR FROM HELL #8
I'm at my desk as usual, and a user calls.

"Hello Computer Room, Simon here, How can I help" I answer.

"I can't get into my account!" A user mumbles at me.

"What was your username please?" I say.

They give me their username. No worries. I look in their account.

"No worries, it was just a badly made login file. I've fixed it, you should be able to login."

"Thanks!"

"No worries. Have a nice day!"

WHAT IS THIS? you're asking yourself. Has the BASTARD OPERATOR FROM HELL turned over a new leaf? Sold out?! GONE INSANE?!!!

Nope. The BASTARD OPERATOR FROM HELL is being logfiled. And if that's happening, I'm being bugged as well. So I'm being nice till I can find the bugs. It shouldn't be long - bear with me.

Ah. One in the phone handpiece. Basic. But then the boss is a sneaky sort, so there's probably a couple more. Ah! And another in the base of the phone and one inside my keyboard. Time for a mad coffee-spilling frenzy. This is a big job, so I bring the whole jug over and wait for a witness. The System Manager comes in.

"Where's that report of mine?" he asks in a surly manner - he's obviously pissed that I haven't implicated myself yet. Antagonist Identified. As the Principal of "BASTARD OPERATOR SCHOOL" (me) will tell you, "There's no problem so large it can't be solved by killing the user off, deleting their files, closing their account and reporting their REAL earnings to the IRS."

I pull his printout from under the coffee jug where I put it, and the coffee splashes all over the phone and keyboard, which for some reason were stacked on top of each other.

"Woopsy!" I say, mock horror on my face. The System Manager's face tells me I was right in my guess.

"Don't think you'll get away with this!" he snarls and stomps off.

I click on the Ethernet monitor and watch the traffic coming out of his PC.

Ah! A memo, authorizing the termination of my contract, going to the laser in the director's office. I make a few alterations to the file in the spool directory and let it go to it's destination. I run my dinky little program that deposits -522 to the PC and our mainframe shits itself.

Later, while booting, I'll remove that nasty logfile business.

Next, I wander into the comms room and plug my earphone into the spare RS232 port in the Directors office. It's amazing how simple it is to bug an office once it's got data lines going to it!

"A PROMOTION!" I say "You've finally written that letter to the head of staffing telling him he's a bum-sucking ass bandit and that you quit?"

"No..."

"Are you sure? It's much better than the one about me being fired.."

"Y.." His eyes widen slightly.

It's like clubbing a seal to death with a foam cushion. He runs to stop the fax. Only, having just resigned, >clicky clicky< his card key no longer works...

Amateurs...

The Phone rings. It's the same guy as before.

"I can get into my account now, but I've run out of disk space."

"Hang on, I'll see what I can do."

>clicky<...
rm -r *

BASTARD OPERATOR FROM HELL #9
I'm driving to work and I'm stuck behind this old guy, the classic slow driver from hell, whose car red-lines at 20 mph and can't take corners at more than 5. I honk my horn but his hearing aid's probably turned way down to "whisper", so I'm stuck.

I make a mental note of his license plate. In fact, I did that 60 times a minute for 15 and a half minutes. Oh dear.. oh dear.... Looks like another call to the DMV Database to register a vehicle as stolen by out of town arms dealers...

I get to work, flick the excuse page over. "ELECTROMAGNETIC RADIATION FROM SATELLITE DEBRIS". Fair enough, it looks like it's going to be a good day.

I log into "****YOU", (the help-desk inquiries username) and go into mail. There's 3 new messages, the first of which is 117 lines long, so it's obviously a storyteller. ****, I hate that. Instead of saying "My account needs more disk space" they tell you about how they're doing this bit of research for a lecturer and how it's got to be in yesterday, and they almost had it but their second cousin twice removed had a perforated herpes scab and lost a lot of blood and had to be rushed into hospital... etc. etc.. I delete the message.

Second message I read, but it's one of those people who can't handle the mail interface and send a null message, so all you get is headers. I reply to the message saying "No worries, we can do that by next Tuesday". Hope it was important.

The last message I leave for tomorrow, because Saturday would be a dull day if I ever had to work then.

The phone rings. I thought I'd fixed that!

I put it on hands free so I can slop some pizza into the microwave.

"Yes" I call.

"Something's wrong with my Boot disk, I can't login to the server."

"Have you got your disk with you?"

"Sure!"

I go get the disk and put it and the pizza in for 5 minutes on "ULTRA-NUKE".

Six minutes later, he rings back.

"It still doesn't work, and now my disk makes a funny noise and smells."

"Sure, no worries. And be sure to run it through our virus checker FDISK when you get a lot of important data on it..."

"I will! Thanks!"

"That's OK - it's my job!"

Xcbzone is running really slow so I kill off a whole lot of database backends that seem to be hogging all the CPU and get back into my game. Much better.

It isn't easy on the front-line, work work work...

I go to the cafeteria for a quick 2 hour snack - they're so nice to me there. They always have been, ever since that computer glitch that registered their kitchen as an organ recipient - very messy. I grab a couple of cans of coke and some cheese things and cruise on back to the office via the first year computer fundamentals lab. I look in the window on the scene that unfolds it- self to me - a lab full of first years with no demonstrator.

WELL I'LL JUST HAVE TO HELP!

I walk on in.

"Right, I'm your temporary replacement demonstrator and today we're going to put our assignments aside for half an hour to learn about the REMARK function, or, as it's known to the computer literate world, rm.."

I should have been a teacher you know - I've got this way with people...

BASTARD OPERATOR FROM HELL #10
I get invited to a lecture as a guest speaker in "Computing Operations Fund- amentals", so I leave the control room in the capable hands of Sam, the janitor and cruise on down.

The lecture starts and goes OK, then there's a 10 minute period where students get to ask a "real operator" questions that they have about operations.

I get out my pad and pen.

"Before we get started" I say, "could you just call out your username before you ask me a question, I find it easier to apply your problem to terms you would understand better."

The lecturer eats all this up - the personal touch really gets to them. "First Question, You over there.."

"What do you think of the privacy of individuals on a shared system?"

"What was your username please?"

"CMS1103."

>Scratchy scritch<

"Computer Privacy... Hmmm. This is a toughie really. You mean stuff like reading the email between you and your counselor about you not wanting to come out of the closet?"

"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGGGGGGGH!"

"AH. Well, he seems to have left - must have picked a bad COMPLETELY RANDOM example. Next question. You, over there..."

"CMS1136. I was..."

"Ah yes, 1136 the only person on campus who subscribes to alt.sex.buggery.by. sailors.dressed.in.mums.clothing."

"It's purely for research purposes!"

"I'm sure it is. You do a lot of story posting for a researcher don't you?"

"NNGggggAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGGGHGH!"

"Next please..."

...

Two minutes later, the lecture theaterŐs empty.

That's the problem with students today, they just don't want to learn.

I go back to control and Sam's asleep at the console again. I think he's after my job. I make a mental note to tap into the salary database and cancel his health and accident insurance payments. You can't be too careful...

I put the phone on the hook for the first time this afternoon and it starts ringing almost immediately. THAT'S IT! I redirect it to 911 catch a bit of shuteye. That'll teach them. OOPS! Almost forgot to turn over the excuse calendar. "STATIC FROM NYLON UNDERWEAR" Nope, too plausible - although in some cases I could do an on-site check. Nah, can't be stuffed. I'll pick another one. "STATIC FROM PLASTIC SLIDE RULES" Now THAT'S one with a challenge!

I un-redirect the phone and drag the rubbish bin so it rests on the printer's stacker - another job well done. The phone rings - this could be the big one!

"Hello?"

"Hi, Um, how do I spell-check my file?"

"Simple, just type `spell' and the filename."

"Thanks."

I'm so bloody nice this morning. Especially as I know that my version of spell introduces errors instead of detecting them. Things like changing friend to freind and vice-versa. What the hell.

The phone rings - it's them again.

"There's something wrong with spell."

"What makes you think that?"

"Because my file is all corrupt now!"

"That doesn't sound like spell to me. Are you logged into through PC?"

"Yes, but I can..."

"Please, leave the technical diagnosis to me... Now, is there a plastic ruler somewhere on or in the desk?"

"Um >clunka<, yes..."

"Right. You've got a static buildup on your hard-drive caused by the changing electrostatic field generated by the ruler - the same one that makes bits of paper stick to it when you rub it up and down your arm..."

DUMMY MODE ON.

"Oh. What do I do?"

"You know how you get paper off a ruler by hitting it on a table lots of times? Well do that with your PC. Say 20 times - lift it about a foot off the desk & drop it."

"Oh. OK."

>crash<
>crash<
>crash<

"Um, the screen went dark."

"That's OK, it's supposed to do that - keep going. And when you're finished, do the screen as well, that static may have gone up the wires to it."

>crash<
>crash<
>crash<...

I hang up. I get up and go out to the public area to put honey in the floppy drives when a guy who looked like Lee Harvey Oswald runs up to me and shoots me, only the sound comes from the machine room, and I can hear the ex System- Managers chuckle....

Later, in the ambulance, I realize. I forgot to get the guys username...

Then everything goes dark...

BASTARD OPERATOR FROM HELL LIVES! #11
The darkness cleared as we got out of the tunnel and it occurred to me that I couldn't be all that injured. Then again, maybe I was. Someone was going to p..

I died.

Of course, a true BOFH considers this not really as dying, but more of going home for the holidays.

Five seconds later, I'm getting the upside of 15Kv across the nipples. (These ambulance guys sure know how to party).

BASTARD OPERATOR FROM HELL LIVES!

Three weeks later I'm back on my backside and feeling rested at relaxed behind the console again. The rest has done me good, I feel great!. I catch up on everyone's email then let the students know I'm back by performing an impromptu preventative maintenance in the middle of lab time by kicking the restart switch (They love it really).

It's the end of the month so all those automatic email reminder programs will be sending messages all over the place. I set the system clock back 7 days to buy some peace and quiet and swap the printer ribbon for the three year old one with holes in it.

I sort through my snail mail and crack open the BOFH Monthly Newsletter, "kill -9" and check out the articles therein. There's a nice piece of making Windows slow, boring and painful, but it looks exactly like the Windows installation instructions to me... Ah, who knows. I head straight to the BOFH Wizard section to see if any of my articles were published. All of them!!! Even the one about the c compiler that randomly removes one line from the source code it's compiling!

The phone rings.

"The Screen on my PC is blank!!!"

"It's the power cord" I say.

"No, I checked that. When I switch it on, it does nothing!"

"It's the power cord" I say.

"No, I checked and it's all plugged in properly. There's no lights on the keyboard or anything."

"It's the power cord," I say.

"Oh. I just noticed, the cord's not plugged in properly!"

"The power cord?" I ask.

"Yes... Woopsy."

"No worries at all" I say "Is it all working well now?"

"Yes, I think so. I'm sorry, you WERE right all along."

"Yes, we're getting a lot of this, it's due to the current Global Warming problem. It causes random thermal expansion and contraction resulting in temperature induced movement of friction based holding mechanisms..."

I listen carefully. Nothing. In other words, <DUMMY MODE ON>...

"You can fix it permanently though'" I say.

"Really? How?"

"Well it's all to do with lowering salt deposits on the metal contacts."

"Oh!" (Dummy mode irrevocably engaged)

"All you need to do is just take the power plug out deposit some dilute mineral salts on it. Do you have some dilute mineral salts on you?"

"Uh, no?"

"OK, no worries, just stick it in your mouth drool into it. But make sure you wipe the plug first to get rid of any germs, and TURN THE SWITCH OFF ON THE MONITOR before you do - we don't want a nasty accident!"

"Oh. OK!"

>Fzzzt< >clunk!<

I hang up as the receiver hits the floor. Disk space is too good for them.

BASTARD OPERATOR FROM HELL #12
I get to work and I'm a bit tired so I plug a thick hunk of copper across the three phase supply and throw the switch. The room is plunged into darkness as the circuit breakers trip and for once the machine room is silent.

I like it.

I pop the phone off the hook and close the curtains on the observation window. Now it's really dark in there. I wouldn't be surprised if someone had an accident in here...

I lift a couple of floor tiles up in the darkness and call our maintenance contractors saying the mini popped the breaker again, then replace the fuses in it with a couple of nails and short the power supply to ground. You can't just hope for this sort of thing, you've got to MAKE it happen.

15 minutes later the engineer arrives and falls down the hole. I pop the floor tiles back on just as the System Manager (a new and very thorough individual) comes in, telling me to watch out, someone could really hurt themselves in the dark...

I nod and tell him that we can't really afford all the downtime, and should I just throw the breaker and hope that there was no major fault. After thinking about the negative publicity we're getting already, he makes the last decision of his short career and tells me to go ahead.

Later, when the smoke clears I examine the smoking remains of the mini. Not a pretty sight...

"Strange that the breaker jammed shut, isn't it?" I say to our manager as he packs up the personal things in his office. "One in a million chance. A pity that someone saw what you did and posted the whole story to comp.misc. You'll be lucky to get a job managing a car computer after all that publicity..."

I go back to the machine room and throw the rest of the breakers to liven everything up, then login and start deleting users' email. I spot an interesting off-the-record sexual proposition from our male consultant to a member of the men's swim team which will make a good MOTD, so I copy it there, modify root's owner name to be "Winker" and password to be "ljkadlkajflkj" (then call the big boss to report a suspected intrusion). Should be at least a couple of hours of login time before we can sort that out. In the meantime, people are just going to have to read that message...

I realize the message has been read when I hear the gunshot from behind the consultant's closed door.

I edit the online help desk information and change the phone number to the System Manager's - he'll probably appreciate the extra calls at such a sad time...

I hear another shot and realize he won't be answering any calls today.

I put the phone back on the hook and flip today's excuse card. "Poor power conditioning". Too plausible. "STATIC BUILDUP". Still a bit too plausible for my liking, but I don't want to run out of cards before the end of the year, so I decide to run with it.

The phone rings almost as soon as I've got "Top Gun" in the video machine so I pause the video and put the phone on hands-free.

"I think I've bought a bad floppy disk."

"Yes?" I wonder if I've suddenly become the consumer's watchdog?

"Well, I've got this disk and it won't format. All the others in the box did so I thought I must have a bad disk."

"Why are you calling me about this?" I ask.

"Well, the disk says guaranteed; where do I go to get a replacement?"

Ah! Of course.

"Well, let's see. Are you sure it's the disk, and not just some problem with static buildup?"

"Huh?"

"Static Buildup, you know, static electricity that's passed from you to the computer."

"But I'm wearing a wrist strap!"

Around about now I realize I'm deep in dweeb country. Wrist straps aren't fashion accessories in my part of town...

"Of course you are, but your average wrist strap has a 1 meg resistor in series with it, a really poor earth. What you need is a direct earth connection. Hang onto the frame of something that's earthed properly."

"What, you mean like our stainless steel bench?"

"Excellent. Now, have you got a paper clip to discharge the static with?"

"Hang on. Yeah."

"OK, with your other hand, poke the clip through the ventilation holes at the back of the unit, and just touch the contact at the end of the thick red wire."

"The one going to the power supply?"

"Yep, that's it."

"....Hey, isn't that the li... >kzzzzt!< >clunk<"

Another call solved by the help desk from hell...

BASTARD OPERATOR FROM HELL #13
I'm busy with my new shell replacement login script, and it's almost foolproof. Let's just say it pops up with:

"Yes means No and No means Yes. Delete all files [Y]? "

upon login. I'm really starting to worry about the number of account break-ins we've been having recently.... The manager isn't though. His main concern appears to be the number of computer-related fatalities on campus. Funny world, isn't it?

I flip the excuse card. "DOPPLER EFFECT" Sounds implausible enough that it's plausible - with a little work of course.

The phone, the bane of my existence, rings.

"Hello, Computer Room" I say, being helpful.

"Is this the Technicians?" The caller asks.

Amazing the number of deaf people that use these things. What the hell, I'm bored...

"Yes it is" I lie (Nixon could've done with me).

"I've got a problem with my floppy drive, it doesn't seem to be reading all the time."

"Hmmm. How old is the drive?"

"About a year.."

"And it sometimes fails and sometimes works, but it's starting to fail more and more?"

"YES!"

"Yeah, it's the Doppler effect of magnetism..."

"I thought that only happened with light and sound?"

>Bullshit mode ON<

"Yes, well it's been found that on a spinning surface, like a disk, the particle's magnetic alignment changes, especially when the head is stationary and slightly magnetized in respect to it."

"Duh. Oh."

"So, what you need to do is to demagnetize the head. Have you got a disk head demagnetizing loop?"

"Uh.... No?"

"OK, we'll have to do it the hard way. Have you got your original diskettes for your software?"

"Yeah."

"Right, chuck them in the drive, one by one, and format them."

"WHAT?!"

"Don't worry, it won't work - remember the drive is failing. All that happens is that the virgin magnetic field of the disks realigns the magnetic field of the head, because they weren't written by a Doppler effected drive."

"Oh, yeah!"

"So, when it gives you a write error and asks if you want to continue, you say yes. Do it with all your original diskettes, then, to complete the demagnetizing process, run a head cleaning diskette through the drive as well, which will pick up the stray magnetic particles clinging to the head."

"Oh. OK. Thanks."

"Don't thank me - IT'S MY JOB."

I put the phone down, it rings again. It's the big boss.

"Simon, could you come to my office please?"

>ALERT!<

Quick as I can, I press the panic button on our LAN-Analyzer, or to be more precise, the "Generate 90% random traffic" button.

"Sure, would you like me to come now, or..."

The other phone rings. I chuck it on hands free.

"Hello, Computer Room, Simon Here, How can I help?"

"THE NETWORK IS DOWN, ALL OUR PCS HAVE **** THEMSELVES!" the voice on hands-free screams into the mouthpiece of the other phone.

"I see" I say calmly "Yes, our Monitor shows it up, it looks to be a bad segment of thin wire - please hold the line while I unplug it"

I press the "I just got a raise" button (AKA "Stop Traffic Generation") on the LAN Analyzer, and almost immediately the user shouts back "Excellent, it's working now, thanks."

"That's OK, don't mention it. Have a nice day."

The big-boss has been listening to all this, so I reckon that the trip to his office won't be so bad after all. I tell him I'll be right down as soon as I secure the net and hang up. On the way down, I invent a new buzzword which always keep management happy. Complete Transient Lockout. Sounds much better than pulling the plug. Like Master-Reset sounds better than off-switch.

I get to his office and the staffing officer is there too. Uh-oh.

"Simon - How would you like to be our System Manager?"

?!!!

"Well... I don't know, I like that hands on..."

"Extra 10 grand a year, Varsity Car..."

"Monaro?"

"OK."

"Sold!"

....And so ends the saga, as it should have at #10.

THE BASTARD OPERATOR FROM HELL #14 (BOFH Rides Again)
Don't ask how I got back, I just did. Suffice to say that work frowns upon management material that uses electrodes to gain client information. Especially when you do it to the boss's in-laws. That's his entertainment.

So I'm back in the saddle. Unfortunately, that means there's a surplus of operators in the computer room. One slam of the tape safe door later, the problem is solved. The knocking dies down in a couple of hours, so I guess the safes really are airtight.

To welcome myself back, I send a message out saying there's a shutdown in 10 minutes. 5 minutes later I shut the system down. I love doing that. I see the hard-disk activity lights flicker as the "disk recovery" phase of startup run through, globally deleting journal files. Funny how we always start up with lots of free disk...

I just get Wolfenstein started and the phone rings. What the hell, I almost missed it while I was away, so I answer it.

"Computer Room" I say.

"THAT WASN'T TEN MINUTES!!!!" the voice at the other end screams.

"What wasn't 10 minutes?" I ask in a pleasant manner. I can see that things have deteriorated in my absence. Spare the rod and spoil the rm -r, that's what I always say.

"THAT! You said it was going to be te... >pause<... Um, who is this?"

"This is the Operator; who did you expect it to be?"

"Darren? Is that Darren?"

"Uh, No. Darren.. Darren is... unavailable... at the moment."

"Oh. Do you know when he'll be back in the control room?"

"Probably around the time of our next backup - the year 2007 or sometime thereabouts I should imagine."

He's toying with asking me if he can recover their files or not. I let him dangle for a few moments.

"Was that all?", I say, nice as pie.

"Well.... NO, it doesn't matter."

"Of course it doesn't. Would you like me to check if your files are OK?" I prompt.

"Would you? I'm a bit new to this system and I'm not too sure what to do."

"Sure. What was your username?"

Everything inside him is screaming at him not to say it - People beside him are screaming at him not to say it.

He says it.

You just can't tell some people.

"OK. Well, it looks OK to me, all your files are in perfect condition!" I say.

"THEY ARE!! GREAT!!"

The relief in his voice is overwhelming.

>clickety< >clickety<

"Yep. Both your x-defaults and AND your newsrc file are OK."

"But.. But what about my site monitoring data?"

"Sorry?"

"There were about 10 files in my research subdirectory, data I'd collected over the past year."

"Oh. Well, I can't see anything. Perhaps you backed them up somewhere?"

"I put a copy in my girlfriend's account.."

"What was her username?"

"Uh.... >pause< ... "

Is he going to do it? Is he?

He does.

Like running down a snail with a steamroller...

>clickety clickety<

"Nope, nothing there either. OH! Hang on, there looks like some form of journal file in your account, it's quite large... I think maybe you should login there and try to recover with it..."

I cat about 100 man files together and slop them in his girlfriends account under then name "rsrch.j"

"How do I do that?"

"OK; can you login yet?"

"Yeah, I think so..... OK, I'm logged in."

"OK, You need to run the file through the mailer to clear the eighth bit, other- wise the journal recovery will probably choke with an instruction error."

"Well, it's got to do with hardware stress fractures. You probably type too hard with your fingers which upsets the internals of the keyboard. It's got to do with dry joints and electromagnetic inductance."

>DUMMY MODE IRREVOCABLY ON< "Oh. OK."

"Now, you've got to type it in 20 times."

"Sure, OK."

He hangs up.

I ring campus security.

"Hey, we've got another crazy in the lab. Apparently he's typing with his nose. He might be armed..."

3 minutes later I hear the shots. I close his account, he won't be needing it any more...

The phone rings. It's my mum.

"Hi Ma, what can I do for you."

"Simon, I've got a problem at work, the floppy disk with all my personal stuff on it is failing I think."

"Oh. OK. Well, have you got any nail polish remover and some cotton wool buds?"

"Yes."

"OK, take your disk out, and clean that brown stuff off the inside of the disk. That's what gets the heads dirty. You should just have a nice clean plastic disk when you've cleaned it completely."

"Oh, OK Simon, Thanks."

"You're welcome. Oh; remember that time you wouldn't let me go over to Graeme's place to watch videos when I was 5?"

"Yeah, why?"

"Nothing..."

THE BASTARD OPERATOR FROM HELL #15
It's a warm afternoon in the computer room. I dunno, maybe I should turn the chillers back on, but what the hell, I've got a cold and I need to keep warm if I go into the machine room.

"OK, you'll need to get rid of the charge those bags have probably given your RAM, after all, you don't want to blow up your computer, do you? Get rid of any woolens that you're wearing and switch to nylon. Run round some cheap carpet, then comb your hair a couple of dozen times and then plug the chips into the comb to keep them steady. Turn your machine on, then plug the memory in and out about 10 times to get the slots warmed up. Then slop them back in, flick the power switch half a dozen times and that should do it!"

"Hey thanks!"

"Don't mention a thing, all part of the service."

I leave for lunch - after all I have been here for 10 minutes solid - and walk past the student labs. I hear a mass of beeping and look round to see a user's screen full of garbage. They've either typed an image file or fingered my account and got the core file I renamed as .plan. By the time he gets his terminal sorted out, his allocation of connect time will be all used up. A tragic shame.

I get back from lunch early a couple of hours later and slip into the Usenet news directory tree, slide on down to alt.binaries.pictures.erotica, then start deleting parts 3 or 4 of the really long GIFs. (After taking a copies myself and overwriting them to the last user backup tape, of course).

Then I get ready to watch the videos I got out from the video shop by taking the printers offline and disconnecting the phone, and I notice that the frame -grabber video player is gone from the office. Someone has obviously moved it while I was away...

I make some discrete inquiries under the threat of rm -r, and find out that the secretary now has possession of it. So I mosey on down and ask to take it away. Only I can't because I've got to sign THE BOOK, saying when it will be back, how many minutes of tape I'm going to put through it, if I'm going to be watching PAL or NTSC etc. Then it's all fed into her personal computer (which I'm not allowed to touch because it doesn't belong to us) so she can produce full color plots about who's not working in the department.

I mention that it's not coming back - as I was the person that put the hammer through the frame grabber in the first place, I should be the one to hold the video. She then tells me that that's not acceptable, and I will have to find some other video to use, she needs access to get to the video 24 hours a day, in case someone needs it. And because she takes her PC home at night, I needn't think that I can fake any borrowing records. All this I see for what it really is - a thinly disguised attempt to gain access to the seat of power (The Operators Room) by the Bastard Secretary from Hell.

I decide to let it slide for once, after all she does get the snail mail into the correct distribution slots about 20% of the time, so that can't be so bad.

Next morning, I get in about 2pm and find that I have three departmental memos about the status of other stuff that is in the Computer Room that has been "incorrectly inventoried" as "Awaiting Repair" (The shithead technician has been leaking privileged information in an effort to score the secretary again - A tragic shame, I used to quite like him..) with a note from the Big Boss authorizing the secretary to investigate. Attached to all that is a note from the secretary herself stating that to action this she requires a 24 hour access key to the Computer Room.

ONCE AGAIN I realize that letting things slide never pays off. I look up the secretary's RS232, Ethernet, Appletalk and Phone port numbers and yank them from the comms rack. What the hell, I kick the circuit breakers to her power points and lighting too while I'm at it. Then I strip off some mains cable and plug it in..

The phone rings a couple of minutes later.

"WHAT'S HAPPENED TO MY ROOM?!" the secretary screeches at me.

"Your room?" I say, in a pleasant and innocent manner, using caller ID to track down the room she's in. Ah! Just down the corridor.

"Yes, MY ROOM! The power's gone off and everything is dead."

"Oh dear. What were you doing when the power went off? Perhaps you did something stupid?"

"I did NOT! I was working on my PC!"

The way she says "my" is really getting to annoy me.

"You were working on your PC?" I say, reflectively.

"Yes!" She snarls.

"Not your own very personal computer?"

"Yes..." She doesn't know what I'm getting at yet.

And now I exercise the basic law of Bastard Operating which roughly says, Bastard Operators don't just win. Anyone can win. Bastard Operators win and totally DEMORALIZE. That's real winning.

"I hope you switched your machine off before you called."

"Why?" she barks, a little uncertain.

"Well, it's just that personal property isn't covered by the site insurance policy. Why, if there was a power surge, heaven knows WHAT could happen to an expensive piece of delicate personal machinery like..."

I hear her place the receiver down very quietly and sprint on tippy toe to the door. As I repeatedly toggle her circuit breaker I start thinking about what I'll be watching on video this afternoon... Still on the phone, I hear a bang way in the background which probably means her PC has **** itself...

10 minutes later the phone in the control room. It's the secretary, and she sounds a little stressed. I manage to translator her sporadic outbursts into a request that her lines be connected to her terminal. I tell her they are, and has she got the technician to look at it. She hangs up.

No sense of humor.

10 minutes later still, the technician rings up and tells me all the secretaries lines are dead. I tell him I'll check them out, then plug her Ethernet, phone and Appletalk back in. Which leaves RS232...

Another 10 minutes later I'm startled out of my snooze by the phone. It's the technician still greasing the secretary by being super-efficient. He tells me the RS232 still isn't working. I make some excuse about dry joints on the plug etc., and ask him to put a new plug on the cable. I hear the >snip!< as he clips the old plug off, and the receiver rattle as he starts to strip the wire in a manly way with his teeth. Then I connect the mains cable to my end of the RS232.

As soon I hear the ">ERRRRRREEEERRKKK!<" coming down the receiver at me, I know that the "incorrect inventory" problem won't be repeated.

BOFHBall - a game for SysAdmins
Developed by Eric L. Pederson
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Object

Be the player with the most points when the game finishes.

The BOFHBall Court

The playing area is a raquetball court with an open viewing gallery at
the top-rear. The floor of the court is covered with 2x2 metal plates
insulated from each other by a rubber grid. Each plate is connected to
an electrical source. Plates are electified at random with varying
voltages, ranging from a mild jolt to a mind-numbing power spike.

Playing the Game

Ten lusers are herded inside the court and the door is locked. The
players (SysAdmins) throw bowling balls from the gallery onto the lusers
in the playing area.

Each player wears a colored vest corresponding to the color of bowling
ball used. A referee is stationed at each end of the gallery to keep score.

Points are scored:

A simple hit: 1 point
A hit, with immediate bleeding: 2 points
A hit, accompanied by the snap of a bone breaking: 3 points
A hit resulting in immediate unconsciousness: 3 points
Causing a luser to knock another luser down while avoiding a hit: 4 points
A hit resulting in immediate death: 5 points

A ball that hits multiple targets before landing on the court will
score as above for each hit, plus one bonus point per target hit.

Once a luser becomes unconscious, no further points may be scored
against that luser. So, the player causing unconsciousness would
receive 3 points, and any players subsequently hitting the luser
would not score points.

BOFHBall is played in one-minute rounds, with breaks between rounds
to recover the balls, police up the dead, etc...

The referees examine the unconscious between rounds, in order to
determine if they are dead. If a luser is found dead, the player
last hitting the conscious luser is awarded the additional 2 points
for a kill. Thus, it is poor strategy to throw at an already
unconscious luser, since it could cause extra points to be awarded
to a competing player.

Also, blood stains are not cleaned up between rounds, so as to
present extra obstacles to the remaining lusers.

Play continues until there are no more conscious targets.

The maximum number of players in a BOFHBall game is four.

Equipment Needed

For each player, 10 colored bowling balls and one correspondingly
colored vest. The weight of the bowling balls is up to the player;
there is no limit. A ball rack will be provided for each player.